Academic Publishing
Academic writing and publishing are an integral part of scientific communication, and the job of a scientist or university teacher. Authors present a wealth of information and knowledge in their works, therefore it is necessary to strive for the successful acceptance of the text for publication. There are some basic principles of academic writing that need to be followed. This can also help gain more scientific impact and citation.
Rules of academic writing
The academic text should have the following characteristics:
- it should be clear why we write the text (the text answers the questions we ask) and it is clear that the author has an overview of the issue (the text demonstrates an understanding of the subject of research),
- the text is structured, logically divided, brings together related topics and findings in one piece,
- presented theses, opinions, arguments are supported by facts, data, evidence,
- the used resources are properly cited,
- the writing style is formal, clear, balanced, consistent, terminologically accurate.
Guidelines for authors
Part of the preparation of an academic text is a careful study of instructions for authors – the so-called submission / manuscript guideline. In this guideline the publisher of a scientific journal defines the basic formal requirements of the text, including the structuring of the text. Instructions for authors from the best known publishers:
- Elsevier Submission Guideline
- MDPI Information for Authors
- PLOS One Submission Guidelines
- Springer Journal Author
- Taylor and Francis instructions for authors
- Wiley Author Resources
Author’s name and affiliation
Be careful when submitting your work to state the correct name of university and faculty. Otherwise, in bibliographic databases such as Web of Science or Scopus, your work could be assigned to other institutions. It is also advised to use your unique identifier (ORCiD, ResearcherID, Scopus Author Identifier).
You always have to state the full name of the university, it is also possible to state a faculty or institute as well.
Tomas Bata University in Zlin
Department of Food Analysis and Chemistry, Faculty of Technology, Tomas Bata University in Zlin
Department of School Education, Faculty of Humanities, Tomas Bata University in Zlin, Zlin, Czech Republic
If you publish under two affiliations, they must always be mentioned separately in the manuscript and the publisher must be asked to comply with these formalities.
The author’s name and surname must appear in order given name, family name. When listed in the inverted order “family name, given name”, a profile in the bibliographic databases is for the author created under the given name, not under the family name.
Reporting errors in Web of Science and Scopus databases
If you find an error in your Web of Science records, you can request a change of data using the form or by clicking on “Suggest a correction” directly next to each record. In the second case, the form will be pre-filled with data to identify the article.
If you find an error in the Scopus database, you can use this form to report it.
In case of any ambiguity with the reporting of errors to the Web of Science and Scopus databases, do not hesitate to contact us via e-mail: vedavyzkum@k.utb.cz.
Where to publish
Methodology of the Czech Council for Research, Development and Innovation defines the publication outputs (articles in journals, conference papers) and which criteria they must meet to be included in the R&D&I evaluation.
It may not always be easy to find the right source to publish your work. The following lines should help you choose a suitable one.
Journal article
Some tools from the journals’ publishers can help you to you choose a suitable journal:
To contribute to good science, it is good to know recognized journals in your field, draw data from them for your research and publish the results of your research there. If you do not know how to choose a specific journal for publishing your article, we will advise you where to find these journals if you contact us via vedavyzkum@k.utb.cz.
Beware of predatory practices prevalent among publishers. If you publish for the first time in the selected journal, check the journal carefully via the page Think. Check. Submit.
Globally recognized academic journals are included in bibliometric databases Web of Science and Scopus. These represent the basic pillar for the evaluation of science and research in the Czech Republic. There may also be specialized subject databases for individual fields.
# WEB OF SCIENCE
Web of Science (produced by Thomson Reuters) is a multidisciplinary bibliographic database of references and abstracts of articles from prestigious academic journals from around the world. Web of Science contains “Core Collection” which provides access to more than 78 million records from top journals, conference proceedings and books in the fields of natural sciences, social sciences, humanities and arts.
Detailed instructions on how to search the Web of Science Core Collection.
Web of Science provides a list of journals with impact factor via the Journal Citation Reports (JCR) database.
JCR provides the following information:
- the most frequently cited journals in given field,
- journals with the most current topics in given field,
- journals with the greatest influence in given field,
- journals with most articles issued in given field,
- comparison of data from given field to the standards in the field (benchmark).
Video about Journal Citation Reports and calculating the IF: https://youtu.be/ZInsNuvrdNg
Information about JCR: http://wokinfo.com/media/pdf/qrc/jcrqrc.pdf
# SCOPUS
Scopus (produced by Elsevier) is a multidisciplinary bibliographic and citation database of peer-reviewed literature. Scopus contains records from scientific journals, books, conference proceedings and provides a comprehensive overview of the performance of world-class research in science, technology, medicine, social sciences, humanities and arts. The Hirsch index indicator can be found in Scopus.
List of journals in Scopus: https://www.scimagojr.com/
# ERIH PLUS
ERIH PLUS is a list of research journals in the field of humanities and social sciences incl. basic information on the same journals.
ERIH PLUS was established by transferring the original contents of ERIH from the European Science Foundation (ESF) server to the Norwegian Social Science Data Services (NSD) server residing in Bergen, Norway. The ERIH was renamed ERIH PLUS in early July 2014.
Advantages of ERIH PLUS in comparison to the lists previously used:
- includes social sciences,
- new disciplines for inclusion of journals (at present in the application form only, not in the search),
- new information about journals — eISSN, URL, status, peer review,
- information about the relation of journal to Open Access (SHERPA RoMEO),
- offers feedback for each journal,
- also journals published outside the EU are included,
- new criteria for inclusion of new journals in the lists,
- new admission procedures for new journals,
- categories A,B/INT1, INT2 and C/NAT have been replaced by the authorship (international, national, local),
- expert panels for the assessment of journals were cancelled – decisions are taken by the NSD, “in special cases” by the ERIH PLUS Advisory Group (ERIH PLUS Advisory Group).
For more information about ERIH PLUS please refer to https://dbh.nsd.uib.no/publiseringskanaler/erihplus/
# DOAJ
DOAJ (Directory of Open Access Journals) is a proven list of freely available journals. The database is created by the Swedish University of Lund and all indexed journals are carefully checked. Thus, so-called predatory journals should not penetrate into the directory. It currently contains a list of almost 14,000 journals across all scientific disciplines.
Conference Proceedings
Conference Proceeding that are evaluated by the R&D evaluation methodology are the ones included in Web of Science or Scopus databases:
- in the SCOPUS, you will find them in “Sources”, the type of the document is Book Series or Conference Proceedings:
- in the Conference Proceedings Citation Index společnosti Thomson Reuters, the resource is assigned an ISBN or ISSN, or both:
ConferenceAlerts informs about upcoming scientific conferences.
Even in the area of scientific conferences, special-purpose conferences with virtually zero benefit for the scientific community began to appear. To avoid attending events, the Think, Check, Attend service was set up. At the same time, it is advisable to discuss a possible attendance to the conference with one of the more experienced colleagues.
Book
Books that are evaluated (B) or chapters in books (type C) have to meet following requirements:
- have more than 50 pages,
- be peer-reviewed,
- present the original research results,
- has an ISBN, or ISMN.
If the book is published in the Czech Republic, the mandatory copy must be registered in the National Library of the Czech Republic. Academic books published abroad must have Reference to Digital Object Identifier (DOI) or must be traceable in an internationally recognized catalogue.